After a slow start, there are signs of progress in restoring order to Haiti—but not yet enough to be reassuring

HAITI'S portly interim prime minister, Gérard Latortue, is an amiable fellow, but he likes to speak his mind. He did so this week in no uncertain terms. “The Haitian people cannot wait any longer,” he said, echoing the mounting impatience and frustration of his countrymen.

In particular, two issues—security and overseas financial aid—currently dominate discussions over how to help Haiti after the bloody ouster of Jean-Bertrand Aristide, its president, in February. Haiti has seen little of the $1.3 billion pledged at a donors' conference in Washington in July. And in recent weeks the security situation has gone from bad to worse.

Pro-Aristide gangs went into open revolt in late September, calling for the ex-president's return—apparently encouraged by the misguided idea that a Democratic victory in the United States election, coupled with popular clamour for Mr Aristide, would bring him back from exile in South Africa. Armed with an impressive array of guns, the gangs erected burning barricades to block entry to their slum strongholds, and at the end of October launched a campaign of violence that gang leaders refer to as “Operation Without-Drawing-Breath”.

In the largely anti-Aristide media it is dubbed “Operation Baghdad”, a reference to the decapitated bodies of policemen that began appearing on the streets. “It's a carefully calculated plan to create panic and disrupt commerce and schools,” says Jean-Claude Bajeux, a leading human-rights activist. He and others, including Mr Latortue, detect the hand of Mr Aristide.

Though the gangs may number a mere 200-300 armed fighters, they are desperate and enjoy support among the poor. Port-au-Prince's slums, such as Martissant, Delmas 2, Bel Air and Cité Soleil, form a strategic cordon around the capital's main commercial district (see map). The sound of gunfire can paralyse the city, sparking mass stampedes as residents scramble for shelter.

The rising death toll, estimated to be more than 120 by mid-December, appeared to catch United Nations peacekeepers unawares. That is largely because the UN Stabilisation Mission (MINUSTAH), which by January will consist of over 8,300 troops and police, was slow to put its boots on the ground. In the UN's defence, its forces are made up of mostly small contingents from 41 countries, including places like Nepal, Benin and Togo, presenting a logistical nightmare.

But by now the peacekeepers have become the butt of jokes. In Pétionville, a wealthy enclave on the slopes of a hill overlooking the capital, the Brazilian troops are referred to disparagingly as les Brésiliennes, in the feminine gender. Others complain UN staff are taking things too easy. “The vehicles of MINUSTAH are found mostly in Pétionville instead of patrolling hot-spots at night,” says Bernard Gousse, the justice minister.

And besides enduring jibes from locals, the Brazilian general in charge of the peacekeepers, Augusto Heleno Ribeiro, complained earlier this month that he was “under extreme pressure from the international community to use violence”. What he commands, he added, is a “peacekeeping force, not an occupation force”. The day before, gunfire had erupted outside the presidential palace while the American secretary of state, Colin Powell, was inside for an official visit.

But MINUSTAH is now finally almost up to full strength, and beginning to flex its muscles. It has made incursions into the slums before alongside the Haitian police, whom local residents accuse of arbitrary arrests, beatings and killings. On December 14th several hundred UN troops in armoured personnel carriers stormed the waterfront Cité Soleil slum, in a surprise attack on a pro-Aristide gang-lord, Dread Wilme. Several people were killed and wounded, according to residents, though the UN said it had no reports of deaths. But the troops successfully reoccupied two police stations that had been abandoned for months.

Such actions, UN officials hope, will eventually crush the resistance. But much remains to be done, and not just in the capital. Former soldiers from the disbanded Haitian armed forces, who participated in the February uprising that forced Mr Aristide from power, continue openly to display weapons in other cities. They also allegedly control several ports, siphoning off customs revenue. This week one ex-officer, Remissainthe Ravix, occupied Mr Aristide's home in the posh suburb of Tabarre.

As for international aid, it has so far done little to alleviate the country's dire poverty. Upon taking office Mr Latortue promised Haitians that donor money would be put to quick use by creating jobs and fixing roads, schools and health clinics. None of that has happened yet. Foreign donors recognise that funding for Haiti has fallen badly behind schedule, and are looking for ways to fix that.

But much of the blame also lies with the Haitian bureaucracy. True, on the fiscal side, Mr Latortue's government has done suprisingly well. Despite the current turmoil, it has increased revenue as a percentage of GDP from 8.2% to almost 9% through fiscal discipline, trimming bloated state entities and reducing corruption—though partly also thanks to an estimated 5% fall in GDP itself. As a reward, officials say, Haiti should receive $140m in balance-of-payments support next year, equivalent to over one-third of government revenue.

Yet ironically, the government seems unaware of the resources it has. After Mr Latortue complained that international financial institutions were being slow to release donor money, World Bank officials had to point out he had cash sitting unspent in his own treasury. The government has also failed to show how it plans to spend $800m in donors' project money. Few projects have been submitted and a commission to oversee bidding for public contracts has only just been set up.

It will take generations of sustained foreign aid noticeably to alter the living conditions of Haiti's 8.4m inhabitants, at least three-quarters of whom live below the UN's standard poverty line of $2 a day. But donors are wary of repeating the errors of the 1990s, when millions of dollars went to waste in failed nation-building. They will need clearer signs of a return to stability to reassure them that they will not be throwing good money after bad.